Cairo - Egypt's Minister of Media Anas al-Fiki has banned four foreign publications for reprinting the controversial cartoons of the Muslim prophet Mohammed that have been widely deemed offensive to Islam, media reports said Wednesday. Distribution of the latest issues of the German newspapers Die Welt and Frankfurter Allgemeine, the New York-based Wall Street Journal and Britain's The Observer were stopped on Tuesday, the Egypt's official daily al-Ahram reported.
The four publications were officially banned from print in Egypt. Al-Fiki said that the ban would be imposed on any other publication that prints offensive images or cartoons of Mohammed.
The cartoon depicting Mohammed wearing a bomb shaped like a turban sparked a wave of anger and violence in the Islamic world when it was first published in Danish and other European newspapers in 2005.
Leading Danish newspapers reprinted the cartoon on February 13, a day after police said they had thwarted an alleged plot to kill the cartoonist, Dane Kurt Westergaard. Three men were arrested in connection with the plot.
The Danish ambassador to Egypt was on Tuesday summoned and told of Cairo's indignation, according to a ministry statement.
Last week Danish parliamentarians cancelled a trip to Iran after Tehran demanded an apology for the republication of the cartoons.
